Please defeat SOPA

GIThruster · Post by **GIThruster** » Sun Jan 22, 2012 8:11 pm

Skipjack wrote: So you think that Youtube, Twitter and Facebook should be taken down?

No. They're not making deliberate attempts to thwart the law. You keep forming these crazy generalizations that don't connect with real life issues. It's obvious there's a huge difference between YouTube which by design, cannot ever distribute full motion pictures, and Megaupload whose primary purpose is to do so. If YouTube were to try to do what Megaupload routinely does, it would have been shut down under current law long ago, so your examples are specious. Further, you're once again ignoring the fact that this law places these decisions in the hands of JoD and that anyone using the blocking function would be completely accountable to the public for that action.

TDPerk · Post by **TDPerk** » Sun Jan 22, 2012 8:21 pm

"It's obvious there's a huge difference between YouTube which by design, cannot ever distribute full motion pictures, and Megaupload whose primary purpose is to do so. If YouTube were to try to do what Megaupload routinely does, it would have been shut down under current law long ago, so your examples are specious."

If that is true, the justifications for SOPA are specious--it isn't needed.

Skipjack · Post by **Skipjack** » Sun Jan 22, 2012 8:30 pm

No. They're not making deliberate attempts to thwart the law. You keep forming these crazy generalizations that don't connect with real life issues. It's obvious there's a huge difference between YouTube which by design, cannot ever distribute full motion pictures, and Megaupload whose primary purpose is to do so. If YouTube were to try to do what Megaupload routinely does, it would have been shut down under current law long ago, so your examples are specious. Further, you're once again ignoring the fact that this law places these decisions in the hands of JoD and that anyone using the blocking function would be completely accountable to the public for that action.

You are focusing to much on movies, probably due to your interest in becoming a screenwriter. What about music? There is lots of copyrighted music on Youtube. Youtube has been a thorn in the side of the record industry for a while. I am sure they would ask for it to be taken down.
Facebook and twitter allow their users to post links to copyrighted materials. They would also be subject to takedowns because of this.
What about a service like Vimeo, which I and many artists use to publish our works, which does not have the same limitations of Youtube. I have yet to see obviously stolen content on there and I guess they are taking it down quickly, but that does not change the fact that it could be used for this.
There are many websites like that. They all are seeing some abuse for piracy of movies and songs and that most likely was not the intent of the creators of these pages. But still, by your logic, they all should be taken down and if not, who is to decide which website stays and which website goes? The smaller ones probably wont be able to fight the takedown and so only the big ones will survive. This of course would totally ruin the free market and without the freedom of he free market, you effectively break the internet. Congratulations!

GIThruster · Post by **GIThruster** » Sun Jan 22, 2012 8:46 pm

Skipjack wrote:who is to decide which website stays and which website goes?

A judge. Who did you want to decide such a thing? These are civil claims. They need to be decided by a judge. If DoJ wants to action for criminal charges, that's a separate issue, and limited to those here in the states and under extradition agreements. The remedy though, concerns quick response because this is the only way to safeguard the material being presented for theft.

In this case, need for an immediate response does indeed mitigate against due process, and is probably the justification for the ex parte provision. I'm not saying I endorse that portion of the bills, but I am saying they make some prima facia common sense.

Again, you're making outlandish claims about how legal authorities will necessarily do wrong, when the bill is obviously written to avoid this, and your assertions that the law is unviable because it can be abused could be leveled against practically every law in existence--it's a red herring.

Skipjack wrote:This of course would totally ruin the free market and without the freedom of he free market, you effectively break the internet. Congratulations!

Sounds like you don't understand what free market is all about. Businesses that buy servers and pentabytes of storage so they can store illegal content and distribute it to others, do so in order to sell advertising and such with other people's property. This action is intrinsically an act against the free market.

kcdodd · Post by **kcdodd** » Sun Jan 22, 2012 10:14 pm

GIThruster wrote:Well I'm not sure what you're referring to, but obviously DoJ doesn't currently have the power to stop megauploads from distributing hundreds of millions of copies of copyrighted material each year. That's why US Chamber of Commerce says this affects 19 million Americans.

Well they seem to have done so anyway, despite not having sopa. So how exactly did they do that if they don't have enough power?

GIThruster · Post by **GIThruster** » Sun Jan 22, 2012 11:29 pm

Megaupload was indeed shut down and its executives indicted and arrested, but only AFTER hundreds of millions of illegal copies were placed into the hands of the thieving public. The goal is to stop the thefts in the first place.

If law exists in the US, where any web site that is found to wantonly violate copyright law can be shut down so quickly they cannot make a profit, then those web sites will cease to exist in short order. This is not about shutting down companies that make small violations by mistake. This is about damage control and large scale illegal activities.

MugaUpLoad had 150 million subscribers and 50 million hits/day. It's founder made $42 million last year alone--all money from stollen goods. New Zealand police seized exotic cars, guns, art work, and $8 million cash--all the ill-gotten gains of someone giving away the property of others. This is just ONE "file sharing" web site. There are many.

Obviously, there's a problem. If you have a better idea of how to solve it, I'm all ears. I agree I'm extremely uncomfortable with the ex parte provision in the bills, but I don't see other remedies to the situation. Any real remedy will be expedited quickly enough that criminals can't make money with these sorts of crimes, and victims will have the harm done to them minimized as greatly as possible.

kcdodd · Post by **kcdodd** » Mon Jan 23, 2012 12:48 am

I still didn't hear your explanation of how the DoJ shut down megaupload without SOPA, when that is the entire argument for it! Clearly they CAN do it if they want to no matter where or who they are. Whether or not SOPA could have made it happen *faster* is irrelevant. And even if it was not irrelevant, it appears there is some debate as to whether SOPA in it's current form would have even applied to megaupload! Again, all the more pointing to why SOPA does not do what it's supporters claim it does!

GIThruster · Post by **GIThruster** » Mon Jan 23, 2012 1:08 am

Sorry, I can't make any sense of this above. Clearly there is call for legislation that allows an immediate remedy when people are distributing copyrighted material illegally.

kcdodd · Post by **kcdodd** » Mon Jan 23, 2012 1:43 am

How can I possibly make it any clearer.

So you are saying now your entire argument is that enforcement is just not fast enough for your taste.

GIThruster · Post by **GIThruster** » Mon Jan 23, 2012 2:07 am

Carter, there is almost NO enforcement. Just because MegaUpLoad (MUL) was finally closed down, the fact this took years clearly demonstrates a better remedy is necessary. Suppose MUL had been run by a group who weren't quite so stupid, and had been in a country where the US has no extradition agreement as with New Zealand? In that case, MUL would still be open for business.

I suggest, if you want to understand the situation better, poke around as I have and educate yourself on the whole "file sharing" issue. Look into the nonsense at MUL as well. We're here talking about people driving Rolls Phantoms with vanity plates that boldly brag "GUILTY". People with a past in felony hacking. The situation with file sharing in general, has nothing to do with Facebook, Twitter or YouTube.

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/story ... 52747338/1

The reason we have an active legislature that routinely creates new laws is we recognize that changing conditions often require changing laws. We still do not have adequate laws to cope with the advent of the Internet.

kcdodd · Post by **kcdodd** » Mon Jan 23, 2012 2:23 am

GIThruster wrote:Carter, there is almost NO enforcement. Just because MegaUpLoad (MUL) was finally closed down, the fact this took years clearly demonstrates a better remedy is necessary. Suppose MUL had been run by a group who weren't quite so stupid, and had been in a country where the US has no extradition agreement as with New Zealand? In that case, MUL would still be open for business.

I suggest, if you want to understand the situation better, poke around as I have and educate yourself on the whole "file sharing" issue. Look into the nonsense at MUL as well. We're here talking about people driving Rolls Phantoms with vanity plates that boldly brag "GUILTY". People with a past in felony hacking. The situation with file sharing in general, has nothing to do with Facebook, Twitter or YouTube.

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/story ... 52747338/1

The reason we have an active legislature that routinely creates new laws is we recognize that changing conditions often require changing laws. We still do not have adequate laws to cope with the advent of the Internet.

So what you are saying is that take-downs, or perhaps even arrests, should be possible without, you know, pesky things like having to build a case against someone or having to deal with the law enforcement agencies and governments that have jurisdiction.

GIThruster · Post by **GIThruster** » Mon Jan 23, 2012 2:33 am

No. I've repeatedly said the precise opposite. In order for the law to work at all, someone needs to make a compelling case before a federal judge.

How is it we're having this conversation if you really don't understand these exceedingly simple things?

kcdodd · Post by **kcdodd** » Mon Jan 23, 2012 3:29 am

Because you continually state that whatever we have now is insufficient and too slow. Since that is what we have now, you must want to do away with it. It's not my fault if your arguments are self contradictory. Done.

Skipjack · Post by **Skipjack** » Mon Jan 23, 2012 4:53 am

The situation with file sharing in general, has nothing to do with Facebook, Twitter or YouTube.

Which is of course BS.
As I explained, plenty of copyrighted material is posted on Youtube, not movies but music. SOPA and PIPA are not limited to movies, you know. Your view is _very_ narrowminded.

Further, both Facebook and Twitter are used to link to copyrighted materials. Since SOPA and PIPA are intending to criminalize this even more and make those running the websites responsible for links posted on them, both Facebook and Twitter are going to be in danger of being shut down. So Youtube, Facebook and Twitter are endangered. You think that I wrong? Then why did Google openly protest these new laws?
So did the others.

GIThruster · Post by **GIThruster** » Mon Jan 23, 2012 5:13 am

Facebook and Twitter are both incorporated and headquartered in the US. There is already sufficient law to deal with them and SOPA does not relate to them. Furthermore, both of these make efforts to thwart copyright infringement. Both Twitter's and Facebook's policies are to block any page that is accused of infringement on the off chance the charge of any third party might prove true, until they can verify the facts, and then they take the initiative to investigate. They are obviously nothing like MUL. They don't make a living by such infringements the way real file sharing services like MUL did.

"The typical scenario justifying the take-down notice involves a user who intentionally posts links to pirated movies and music, while encouraging other to consume this content. It is possible, however, that a tweet contains significant, original expression and incidentally used a link to infringing material to emphasize its point.. . .

"There is potential for liability under the doctrine of contributory infringement when the defendant intentionally links to known, infringing material. The Copyright Act does not expressly hold that anyone can be liable for the infringing activity of another party Sony Corp. v. Universal City Studios, but courts have developed common law doctrines to extend secondary liability as we have seen in MGM v. Grokster and more recently the Limewire case. In both of these cases, however, the copyright holders sued the services making infringement possible through their P2P technologies. This would be more analogous in the current situations to a copyright owner going after the destination site of the link, rather than dealing with Twitter or the linking user, for whom secondary liability may exist."

http://jurist.org/forum/2011/04/140-cha ... stions.php

Again, you need to look at the intent of the law. Current law could and indeed does on occasion, place innocent people in jail for murder. The fact the law can go wrong, is no reason to not have laws. SOPA is intended to form a remedy against criminal activity that safeguards IP and discourages theft industries. The fact it may at sometime in the future go astray, is no argument against a law.